An Assessment of the Concurrent Validity and Reliability of the Merkler Style Preference Inventory (MSPI

This study examines three aspects of a new vocational interest assessment, the Merkler Style Preference Inventory (MSPI). The MSPI is a 60-item computer-administered instrument that makes vocational pursuit recommendations based on an interest profile. It also produces a list of recommended college majors. Seventy-eight undergraduates from a large midwestern university participated in a study in which they took the MSPI and either the Strong Interest Inventory-Strong Vocational Interest Battery (SII-SVIB) or the Kuder Preference Record (Kuder) during one evaluation session. In a follow- up 2 weeks later, the participants took the MSPI once again and the inventory that was not administered during the first session. Order of SII-SVIB and Kuder form completion was randomly assigned. Test-retest reliability across the six subscales of the MSPI ranged from .70 to .86 with a median reliability of .79. Internal consistency coefficients for the six MSPI subscales ranged from .49 to .74 with a median correlation of .72. Concurrent validity correlations of the MSPI with the SII-SVIB ranged from .25 to .52 with a median correlation of .34. The same analysis for the Kuder produced a range of correlations from .31 to .63 with a median correlation of .41. A confirmatory factor analysis using LISREL indicated a stronger empirical alignment of the MSPI on the Kuder than on the SII-SVIB, even though the MSPI was modeled after the dimensions of the SII- SVIB. Recommendations are made for future work on this instrument.